It was a tale of two halves, but the Leeton Greens were able to keep their season alive after a 16-point win over Yenda at Wade Park in the minor semi-final.
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After a back-and-forth start to the game, it was Leeton who was able to strike first through Billy Rabua, while Kirtis Fisher followed him over soon after.
A try each to Rhys Wilesmith and Hayden Philp within the final nine minutes of the first half had Leeton looking like they would romp into the preliminary final, leading 22-0 at the break.
The Greens maintained the momentum early in the second half as Daniel Fisher found his way over after the Blueheelers allowed the second-half kick-off bounce into touch.
That seemed to spark the Blueheelers into life as just three minutes later, Todd Granger got his first of the afternoon.
The Blueheelers went on to score another two tries within eight minutes, with Henry Taylor and Granger finding their way over either side of a sin-binning to Leeton's Sebastian Blackett.
Yenda's resurgence continued as after Leeton left an Isaiah Little-Buerckner chip as they thought it was going into touch, Granger got to the ball just before it went out to score his third of the afternoon and with 19 minutes remaining, it was an eight-point game.
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With Leeton Todd Prest and Yenda's Sosaia Langi sent to the sin bin after some push and shove, Leeton was able to refind their mojo and two quick tries to Kirtis, and Josh Fisher got their side back out to a 38-20 lead.
Buerckner pulled one back for Yenda before Blackett was able to wrap up the 42-26 win for Leeton.
Heading into next week's preliminary final, Leeton coach Hayden Philp knows his side needs to be better.
"We have to work on it, but we are just taking it one game at a time," he said.
"We played far better than we did last week, and we just have to step up again for next week."
The Leeton side wasn't helped by injuries to Rhys Whilesmith and Corey Graham, but he credited his side for the extra minutes they had to play.
"Pretty (Todd) had a week off last week and played nearly the whole game," he said. "There were some big efforts, especially on a day like today."
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